Author : John Henry Walsh
Publisher : Rarebooksclub.com
Page : 122 pages
File Size : 49,23 MB
Release : 2013-09
Category :
ISBN : 9781230190952
Book Description
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1872 edition. Excerpt: ...found under Alano, in the dictionary compiled some two hundred years ago by the Spanish Academy--the alan was "a large, high-couragcd dog, used in bull-fights fiestas de toros) to pull the bulls down by hanging on to their ears, also for hunting wolves, wild boars, and other large beasts of chace, and for guarding the house." Thus he seems to have been the Spanish mastiff. I pass over the fact that Strutt writes "alaunts or bulldogs," aud that modern dictionaries generally render alano by bulldog, and bulldog by alano. I ground my opinion on the statements of writers who describe animals they had seen and were familiar with. I cannot trace the alan in any English authority before Chaucer, who describes him as a white dog used in the chase of the "leon and the bere;" nor can I find him amongst the early dogs of France or Germany, though he was evidently largoly used for crossing as soon as he was well knowD. Hence I think that, like the originals of the spaniel, setter, and pointer, he came from Spain. Our modern hound combines scenting quality with speed, but "Carrier" must be aware that our predecessors once used to hunt with swift hounds and scenting hounds. I must refer him to "L'Art de Venerie," by Turci, huntsman to Edward II., for the proper method of putting up the hare with scenting hounds and chasing her with fast hounds; much as the spaniel, or his predecessor, put up, the game at which the hawk was flown. The German in the thirteenth century, when he rode in the. forest, was bound to have his winden and bracken (fast hounds and scenting hounds) coupled. The "Maister of the Game" will give him further hints about what was done in the time of Henry V., and an old French...